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Dessert

Christmas Plum Pudding

A steamed pudding made with milk, bread, flour, sugar, eggs, suet, currants, raisins, citron, brandy, spices, and baking soda.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 14 ingredients
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Why it works: Flour and raisin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 9,075 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Christmas Plum Pudding

Ingredients

Directions

Make the batter

  1. In a large bowl, combine the milk, grated bread, flour, sugar, eggs, suet, currants, raisins, citron, brandy, nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, and baking soda. Mix well until all ingredients are thoroughly combined.

  2. Pour the mixture into a pudding mold.

Steam

  1. Steam the pudding for 4 hours.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Flour + raisintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together9,075 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  2. Currant + brandytop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together3,057 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).

  3. Currant + raisintop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together6,180 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, creamy).

  4. Milk + breadtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together11,466 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-undecenal (sweet).

  5. Raisin + brandytop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together2,768 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Flour
Provides the starch and structure that hold the pudding together as it cooks.
Eggs
Bind the mixture and help it set firm as the pudding cooks.
Grated bread
Adds body and soaks up the milk, giving the pudding a soft, tender crumb.
Suet
Adds fat that keeps the pudding moist and rich in texture.
Raisins
Add sweetness, chewiness and moisture to the finished pudding.
Baking soda
Reacts with the acidic dried fruit and brandy to lighten the pudding's crumb.

The step that matters

Steaming the pudding. The pudding must cook gently and steadily for the full time so the eggs and starch set through the centre. Too little time leaves it wet and dense, while letting the water boil dry can scorch the mold or leave the pudding dry.

Swap the currant

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (milk, bread, flour, sugar, egg, raisin, brandy):

  1. Vanillafits better
  2. Figfits better
  3. Datesfits about as well
  4. Currantthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against milk, bread, flour, sugar, egg, raisin, brandy. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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